


heartstrings

by latdetvara



Category: No Fandom
Genre: Musicians, Romance, Teen Angst, Teen Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-09
Updated: 2016-06-09
Packaged: 2018-07-13 22:59:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,928
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7141583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/latdetvara/pseuds/latdetvara





	heartstrings

There was a postcard in her mailbox from Seattle.  
‘sorry I couldn’t stay longer, but we knew it wasn’t going to last, right?’  
Ripping it in half, Nat laughed. of course. of course, he would send a postcard instead of calling or actually saying goodbye, typical Leo, making everything so nonchalant. She hated it but she loved it. She hated it because she loved him. And she hated it because she knew she’d miss him, even though he’d be traveling and probably not even thinking of her.   
Going inside, she taped the postcard back together, and sticking it to the fridge, she covered his swirly “Leo Toledo” signature with a magnet. 

The door to the coffee shop clanged behind her, drowning out Ian the barista’s goodbyes. It wasn’t that she didn’t like Ian the barista, it was just that she genuinely hated Mondays. She glanced down at the phone she held in her hand and took a sip of coffee.Freaking Mondays. Nat loathed them. Mondays, as she saw it, were the worst days of the week.   
She should have thought to step around the gap in the sidewalk like she always did, but again, it was a Monday. The hole between the two slabs of concrete created a niche, the perfect size for a shoe. Nat’s shoe, to be exact. The toe of her recently bought, not on sale, suede boot slid in the gap of the concrete and sent Nat flying. She had terrible reflexes, and landed entirely on her stomach when normal people would have caught themselves. The crunch of her coffee cup beneath her sent her stomach dropping, signaling a sense of doom. Then there was laughter.   
She knew that laugh, only one person had a guffaw like that. She turned, sitting up.   
Leo. Leo fucking Toledo.   
Fucking Leo Toledo of Leo Toledo and the Broken Falcon Brothers Band. But she’d known him before he was that. She’d known him as Just Leo, then watched as his music finally got the recognition it deserved, sending him into orbit and pulling them apart.   
He smiled at her. And, God, he looked great. His sun-kissed hazel skin looked so clear and dewy she was envious and it seemed life on the road made him softer: his eyes were subdued and ponytailed hair slightly frizzed, a little bit of pudge was covered by the dark sweatshirt he was wearing. She nodded, muttering obscenities. Of course, he couldn’t have been in town when she looked really great or anything, because that’s just how her luck worked. 

“I thought you were in Seattle.” Nat muttered, glaring down at her stained shirt and wrecked boots. She’d kept his postcard from Seattle up on her fridge for the past six months, taking it down two days prior. Nat stood up, hating the universe for putting Leo right there when she was at her worst. 

“I’m not, obviously.” He stated, shrugging. “Let’s go in and get you another cup. Or we could drop by my place since it’s on your way--”

“Uh, thanks but no thanks. I’ll just wear my jacket closed.” She replied, promptly zipping her leather jacket shut to cover the stained band tee and moving closer to her car. Leo unwound the scarf from around his neck and draped it on hers. 

Nat watched him as he did this, his eyes focused on the task at hand, so she could study his features. It had been so long since she’d seen him last. Life on the road had made him softer and stubble was growing on his chin, something she’d never noticed before. She wasn’t sure that it suited him, but then his deep eyes were looking back at her and she needed to look away. 

“There. That’s better than the stained shirt at least.” 

The scarf smelled like him, Jack Daniels and Yves Saint Laurent L'Homme. “Thanks.”

“No problem. I’ll call you later?” Leo asked, grinning. 

“Text me. You know I don’t do calling.”

“Right.” His smile fell slightly. “Okay. Well, until later.”  
“Yeah, bye.”

“I hope the rest of your day goes better.” He called as she was hopping into her car. God, he was so nice that it made her hate herself. 

“Thanks, Leo.” She said to her steering wheel. 

 

All she ever wanted to remember was the first day they met. She wanted to forget all the crap and baggage that came after he’d left, because it didn’t really matter. What mattered was how simple it was before then and she wanted it all back.  
The day they’d met had been a very ordinary one. She’d always seen him playing guitar with the twins, their little group always being surrounded by people on the quad at campus. They were not completely loud, but it was obvious that they loved the attention. Especially Leo. And she always stayed as far away as possible, but he was magnetic, even then. Nat had been sitting in her usual spot, a little park bench near the art studios and library on their campus, underneath a big oak tree. Leo and the twins were nowhere to be seen that day, and she enjoyed the newfound silence. Until he’d decided to sit next to her. He’d just plopped down, guitar clanging against the bench, causing the birds in the tree above them to scatter. She glared at him, then went back to her work. 

“So,” He’d said, scooting closer. “I’m Leo.”

“Natalie. I was enjoying the silence before you’d decided to ruin it.” She said, continuing to study her notes. 

“Oh, sorry. Do you want me to leave?” He asked, picking up his guitar and strumming it. 

“Oh, no,” Nat had replied sarcastically, “Please stay as long as you like and continue talking to me while I finish my homework because that’s not distracting at all.”

“Okay.” He said. She rolled her eyes. 

“You’re not very good at reading sarcasm.”

“You’re not very good at being nice to people.”

Nat finally looked up at him: he was staring at her, smiling. “Okay, yeah, that’s true.”

“So, to make it up to me, will you come to a thing tonight?” Leo asked, still strumming. 

“A thing? Are you asking me out?”

“Yeah. It’s a thing me and my friends-”

“My friends and I.” Nat mumbled. 

“Are doing with a couple other bands. You can hang out and then write about it for the newspaper, if you want.” He paused, reading her mind already, “I’m not totally blind, only sort of. You’re on page four. You’ve got your own column.” He stated matter-of-factly. And he was right, she was the editor and co-founder of the newspaper itself. 

“Okay fine, I’ll come.”

“Great, it’s at the green space across from the AppleBee’s on Washington Ave., at seven o’clock.”

“I’ll be there.”

“I hope so.” He smiled, then left.

 

And now he was back again. It wasn’t as if a whole part of her had gone when he’d left, it wasn’t like that. It was the kind where it felt more than whole to be together, like two wrongs making a right or oil and flame. They worked just fine on their own, but when they’d be near each other, things were just better. It wasn’t as if the birds stopped chirping or as if the sky had fallen, it was just a lot more lonely. If only she knew if he felt the same.   
There were a lot of things Nat knew she shouldn’t have done. She knew when she was 5 not to jump off of the swing set, but did anyway. She knew when she was 15 not to break into the city swimming pool. She knew when she was 19 that she shouldn’t fall for the boy she barely knew with deep eyes and a kind heart and a passion for music, but did anyway. And she knew she shouldn’t have accepted the tickets that had somehow miraculously appeared under her door. And as the lights dimmed and his echoing footsteps came closer, and screams started, she knew she was in for a beautifully devastating hurricane. 

“Hey guys,” Leo mumbled into his microphone, looking sideways at one of the twins who was smirking while the screaming intensified. “I’m Leo Toledo and these guys are the Broken Falcon Brothers’ band, but you knew that already.” 

He started with the first song they’d written, she knew it was the first because she was there. He loved it when people sang his words, he’d always wanted to be special. He just never realized that he already was. She knew he’d written it with his mom and family in mind, but it always sounded like a love song to her.   
The words tumbled out and the magic of his voice quieted the entire venue.   
“Don't think I don't love you  
When I walk out the door  
Don't think I don't love you  
Because I couldn't love you more.”

God, she couldn’t help herself but fall in love with him all over again. How could something bad for her look and feel so good?   
She missed it all so much. His magic voice, and the way he smiled when he was excited, which was a lot. The way he hummed unwritten melodies while driving, or cooking, or even, for Godsake, watching TV. She loved it all and she loved the way he slid in his socks across tiled floors, or how he always had to have a glass of chocolate milk before bed, the syrup stirred in kind and only that kind, or when he would be napping on the couch after a long night of writing and mumble in his sleep. And as much as it would probably hurt when he left again, she knew she needed to be near him to survive.   
The rest of the show drifted past quickly, it all seeming like a blur, with just Leo and his spotlight in focus. When the venue was dark and there was nobody around, she decided she needed to find him. 

It wasn’t hard. He’d always been easy to spot. 

His back was facing her, but it was definitely him. That long, wavy ponytail and that white tee shirt that was sticking to the sweat on his back. Nat’s heart started racing, she could feel the pounding in her toes and hear it in her ears. 

A blonde girl. One with bright lipstick that was now smudged, and skinny legs that Nat could only dream about, was with him. And he was holding her hand, leading her on the bus. The girl was giggling at top-notch like he’d just said something so funny and it took almost everything Nat had not to crumble into a thousand pieces. Something broke inside her. 

She realized that her feet hurt, and she was really hungry and that maybe she might throw up. The door slammed behind them.  
She tried not to think about what was happening inside that bus, but it was hard to push the images out of her mind. Nat wished it was her. And not in the gross sexual way, no, she wished it was her that he was leading into the bus, into his world.  
Nat knew she shouldn’t have gone there. She knew that Leo had probably changed. And she knew that he was right when he’d said that they both knew it wasn’t going to last, but her heart got the better of her. It always did.   
So, like he’d done to her many times before, she left without saying goodbye.


End file.
